by Hugh Brogan
The westerners had no sympathizers in the East: Sam Adams had long since lived down the indiscretions of his youth and was as hot against defaulting agitators as if he were Thomas Hutchinson himself. Business conditions were very bad for the time being: the peace had brought a rush of goods to the United States, which had quickly glutted the market. As a result many importing merchants had been ruined; trade was now at a standstill, even for the rum distilleries (according to an English traveller). It was time to put the public finances on a sound footing, so as to diminish inflation, restore confidence and thus, perhaps, initiate an economic revival. So the legislators relentlessly hounded the farmers to pay their taxes. At length it was more than the westerners could bear. In the autumn of 1786, led by a former Continental officer, Daniel Shays (1747–1825), a veteran of Lexington, Bunker Hill and Saratoga, they rose in rebellion, closing down the county courts which were sending so many of them to debtors’ prison,3 and threatening to march on Boston. But they were unarmed, except for pitchforks, the federal arsenal at Springfield was successfully defended against them, and so they were easily dispersed by the state militia. There was not going to be a second revolution in Massachusetts; and anyway the state government showed itself to be more wise and lenient than George III. The rebels were punished lightly, and some of their demands were granted: there were no Intolerable Acts. In 1787 prosperity began to return, and discontent died down.
None the less, Shays’s Rebellion was a terrible shock to respectable Americans. The nature of the uprising was largely unknown to people outside Massachusetts; all they could see was that an armed revolt against a duly constituted republican government had come dangerously close to succeeding; that property was in danger; and that nowhere in America was there sufficient force to defeat another such challenge, either internal or external (Chief McGillivray was just now beginning his successful depredations on the Georgian frontier).4 George Washington’s reaction, as so often, was entirely representative:
What a triumph for the advocates of despotism, to find that we are incapable of governing ourselves, and that systems founded on the basis of equal liberty, are merely ideal and fallacious. Would to God that wise measures may be taken in time to avert the consequences we have but too much reason to apprehend.
The important thing to understand here is what Washington meant by ‘wise measures’. He saw the problem as essentially political, not economic; and therefore the cure he looked for was also political. He decided, like many another solid citizen, that the time had come to amend the Articles of Confederation.
The remedy may seem somewhat remote from the disease. Perhaps it was, for Massachusetts was not the only place where economic conditions began to improve long before any effective political action at the national level had been taken. But a number of well-placed gentlemen had been agitating for a reform of the Articles for some years; and in a crisis men tend to adopt whatever programme is on offer, without scrutinizing its fitness too nicely. The great point is to be doing something. The economic argument for a reform was not wholly implausible: the underlying causes of American debility were British mercantilism, which only a strong national government could challenge successfully, and the collapse of the national credit, which only such a government could restore. Washington’s brilliant young protégé, Alexander Hamilton of New York (1755–1804), believed in these propositions passionately. To his mind ‘the three great objects of government, agriculture, commerce and revenue, can only be secured by a general government’, and he was prepared to say so, in season and out of season, and recommend a pretty strong general government into the bargain – certainly a much stronger one than that set up by the Articles. Others were less single-minded on the point than Hamilton; or they had entirely different reasons for wanting a reform. To them, Shays’s Rebellion was more an opportunity than an argument.
American government under the Articles of Confederation has no doubt been unfairly attacked, both in its own time and since. The Confederation Congress had some real triumphs to its name. It had conducted the revolutionary war feebly but successfully and secured a generous peace treaty through its chosen emissaries. In the years since 1783 it had achieved a settlement of the Western land question that was to be of incalculable importance to the American future. To get the Articles ratified it had been necessary to induce Virginia and other states with charter claims to relinquish them and concede that the vast stretch of territory between the Appalachians and the Mississippi, between the Great Lakes and the borders of Florida, should be held by Congress on behalf of all American citizens. The existence of this heritage did much to cement national loyalties and to diminish the importance of state identities. Next, in 1785, Congress had passed the Land Ordinance first drafted by Thomas Jefferson, which laid down, with all the brilliant rationality of its author, how and on what terms the national lands should be disposed of. Jefferson was indeed the Father of the West: as President he would purchase Louisiana and send out the Lewis and Clark expedition; but the Land Ordinance was his masterpiece. If most of America is today a chessboard it is because of his plan, by which the public lands were surveyed and divided into townships (as in New England) six miles square. Each township was subdivided into thirty-six further rectangles, known as sections; and these sections were to be sold whole, at not less than a dollar an acre, to developers. Not many American farmers could pay $640 for a whole section, so the Ordinance was a boon for the speculative land companies; but even they had to subdivide their sections and sell at fairly low prices eventually, if they were to find customers and make a profit; meantime the Ordinance secured an orderly growth of the West. Finally, in 1787, when settlement of the Ohio river valley was about to begin, Congress passed the North-West Ordinance, which provided for the political organization of the new lands. Under this law three stages were envisaged for the North-West. First, it would be ruled by a governor and judges appointed by Congress. Then, when it had acquired 5,000 free male adult inhabitants, it would become a self-governing ‘territory’, a colony, as it were, with its own legislature and a non-voting delegate in Congress, but still with an appointed governor. Finally, when any part of the territory had acquired 60,000 free inhabitants it could (Congress consenting) become a state of the Union, on an equal footing with the old thirteen. To prevent the old states being totally swamped by the new, it was laid down that no more than five (and no less than three) states might be carved out of the territory. Various other provisions of the Ordinance guaranteed to the Westerners what would one day be known as the American way of life: civil rights and liberties, religious freedom, education – even, or especially, personal freedom: for it was laid down that ‘there shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude in the said territory’.
The North-West Ordinance became the pattern by which all future territorial acquisitions were regulated, and it shows conclusively that the Confederation Congress could act wisely and effectively on some matters. But its diplomatic and military strength was nil; its financial affairs were hopeless. Under the Articles, Congress had as little power to tax American citizens as George III had after the repeal of the Stamp Act – less, in fact, since it could not even impose a duty on tea. It had to rely on the system of requisitions employed by the English government during the Seven Years War: that is, it asked the state governments for money and, if it was lucky, got some (it never got all it needed). Various unsuccessful attempts were made to solve the problem: one promising notion was the imposition of a 5 per cent import duty; unfortunately the Articles required the unanimous consent of the state assemblies to make such proposals effective, and the impost, as it was called, was always one state short of ratification. The strictest economy could not make up for the resultant shortage of funds, and brought other disadvantages. For instance, at one point the standing army was reduced to eighty men. Even those Americans who most passionately distrusted this potential instrument of tyranny could see that this was an unsatisfactorily small force. Its numbers were al
lowed to grow; that of course meant that its cost rose too; even so it never became effective: during Shays’s Rebellion it was the Massachusetts militia which saved the Springfield arsenal, much to the mortification of General Knox, the Secretary of War.
By 1786, then, it was clear to all well-informed men (especially to those who had served in Congress) that the national government needed a thorough overhaul if it was ever to be worthy of the name. Not everybody wanted it to be worthy of the name: the smaller states were nervous about their future in a strengthened federation, and in all the states there was a reluctance to sacrifice the joys of quasi-independent power. In one sense American unity had weakened in the years since Lexington: Congress had come to exist almost on sufferance, as the mere instrument of the state governments, which ran themselves without interference – except from each other, and in some cases their bickering was getting out of hand. They erected customs barriers and taxed each other’s trade where possible: for example, New York imposed a tax on all vessels trading through her waters to New Jersey or Connecticut. This sort of thing generated a great deal of ill-feeling, leading some observers to expect an inter-state war in the near future.
The men who had fought the British regarded all this with ever-increasing dismay, but also with a determination not to let their achievements be undone. Far away in London John Adams wrote a long, able, ill-organized work on the principles of republican government, which at least forced its readers to think. Nearer at hand, Alexander Hamilton, so early as 1780, suggested that ‘a Convention of all the States, with full authority to conclude finally upon a General Confederation’ ought to be summoned. This was the plan eventually adopted, but political talents of a different order from Hamilton’s were required to bring it about.
Hamilton served in Congress in 1782–3. While there he got to know a promising Virginian, a few years his senior, a small, quiet man called James Madison (1751–1836). They struck up an alliance, for their strongly nationalist views were, at this period, largely identical, although Hamilton already favoured a much more powerful, aristocratic government than did Madison. For the rest, their talents were complementary. Hamilton was the more dazzling and eloquent, depending less on information than on intellectual power. Madison was deeply learned in public law and constitutional theory; a man of pellucid intellectual clarity; a most hard-working, conscientious public official, whether as a member of Congress or of the Virginian assembly; above all, a man whose human warmth and reliability won him friends and allies wherever he went. He was a consummate politician, and, as Jefferson’s right-hand man (they first joined forces in the strenuous and successful battle to disestablish the Anglican church in Virginia), was always sure of good advice when his own subtlety failed him. It was he, more than anyone else, who made sure that when the opportunity for reform occurred it was seized. He began by bringing about a conference between Maryland and Virginia to settle problems arising out of the joint navigation of the river Potomac. The conference did little for the Potomac navigation, but it popularized the idea that a larger conference, between all the states, might be useful in sorting out the Union’s commercial entanglements. Virginia sent out an invitation to the other states to meet at Annapolis, Maryland, in September 1786 to confer on ‘the trade of the United States’. Only five states in the end sent delegations, but that was all to the good. Hamilton and Madison were among those present; so was Edmund Randolph, a cousin of Jefferson, governor of Virginia, and much influenced by Madison. Thanks to Madison’s diplomatic skill Hamilton was induced to write a moderate, and therefore acceptable, letter to the states arguing that the problems of trade could never be solved until the Articles of Confederation were re-drafted; and Randolph approved it. Hamilton’s document called for a convention, to meet at Philadelphia on the second Monday in May 1787. Its purpose was
to take into consideration the situation of the United States, to devise such further provisions as shall appear… necessary to render the constitution of the Federal Government adequate to the exigencies of the Union; and to report an act for that purpose to the United States in Congress assembled as, when agreed to by them and afterwards confirmed by the Legislatures of every State, will effectually provide for the same.
The three clever young men then persuaded their nine colleagues at Annapolis to adopt this report; and went home to persuade the state governments too.
At this point Shays’s Rebellion occurred. For a moment all, or almost all, were convinced: Mr Madison’s scheme must be given a trial. Twelve states (Rhode Island was the exception) agreed to send delegates to Philadelphia; Congress approved the plan; and on 14 May 1787 the convention officially opened.
It was a unique occasion in American history (indeed, it is not easy to think of a parallel anywhere: perhaps the closest is the Council of Nicaea). It was the crowning act of the American Revolution; next to the decision for independence, it was the most important; and it was a huge, though not unqualified, success. Add to this the personnel of the convention, and it is not surprising that Americans have traditionally regarded it with religious awe. Thomas Jefferson, the American minister in Paris, set the tone when he wrote from afar that ‘it is really an assembly of demigods’ (a remark which he later regretted). At times the air of reverence has grown so thick as to be stifling, notably at the end of the nineteenth century; this in turn has provoked a healthily sceptical reaction. Still, the truth must not be overlooked: the constitutional convention of 1787 was indeed an astonishing and impressive affair; history’s business is to characterize and explain its success, not to question it.
The problem that the delegates had to solve was daunting but finite: how to devise a permanent framework for the government of the American nation. So put, it is obvious that one of the reasons for their success was that this problem had been in the offing ever since the foundation of Jamestown. Various expedients had been tried, including substantially complete independence for each new settlement (during the seventeenth century) and government from Westminster (during the eighteenth); their failure had convinced almost all Americans that their future must lie together, as one confederated body politic. Even during the convention, various other suggestions would be made, but usually only as debating points. The great decision was implicit in the history of the previous 180 years and had been amply confirmed by the events of the Revolution: the United States would be a nation. The framers of a new constitution would only have to settle the details.
Their success in this task was undoubtedly due to their own exceptional qualifications for the work. The political and social conditions which had bred such a generation of wise, capable and public-spirited men have already been sufficiently described: the long experiment in self-government, whether as attempted in Massachusetts, Pennsylvania or Virginia, now reached its logical culmination. Equally important was the personal experience of the delegates. They were not a random group, but the cream of the Revolutionary leadership. There were some notable absentees: Jefferson; Adams; Patrick Henry, who was elected, but refused to serve, explaining later that he smelt a rat; Sam Adams, who was not elected. But for the rest, the great makers of the Revolution were all present, from John Dickinson, who had attended the Stamp Act Congress, to Rufus King of Massachusetts, one of the chief architects of the North-West Ordinance. Alexander Hamilton was a New York delegate. Connecticut had sent a strong team, dominated by Roger Sherman, who according to Jefferson never said a foolish thing in his life: he had signed the Declaration of Independence. But for star quality, no state could rival the Pennsylvanian and Virginian delegations. Pennsylvania sent its President, Dr Franklin, now a martyr to gout and stone, but still alert and acute; James Wilson, Scottish-born, one of the ablest men in the convention; Gouverneur Morris, one of the most forceful; and Robert Morris (no relation), who had suffered nearly as much in his attempts to handle the finances of the Revolutionary War as had Washington in the field, and for the same reasons. Virginia sent Washington himself (it had taken the most earnest
efforts of Randolph and Madison to persuade the General to accept his election); George Mason, the patriarch of the state’s politics, the indispensable adviser of his more visible countrymen, Washington, Jefferson, and Madison; Edmund Randolph; and James Madison. The convention was a surprisingly young body: nearly half its members were under forty, and one, Charles Pinckney of South Carolina, was under thirty. But almost all of them had been seasoned in the great drama of the Revolution. In the early days of their deliberations the learned Madison showed a tendency to dwell on the lessons to be derived from the Amphictyonic League of ancient Greece; but such musty reasoning was never usual and was soon almost entirely abandoned. Instead the records of the convention are full of allusions to American experience, whether before or after independence; at war or at peace; at state or at national level. These veterans of the army, of the Continental Congress, of the Revolutionary state assemblies and of high diplomacy had been too profoundly shaped by their service ever to forget that what they produced must fit Americans, and be justifiable in terms of the American experience and American aspirations. Only Alexander Hamilton, the high flyer, wasted the convention’s time by orating at length on the beauty of principles that had no chance of popular acceptance. The rest were intensely practical, though some of them wasted time in other ways: Luther Martin, of Maryland, brilliant, drunken, was a notable bore.